Interview with JUDAS THE DANCER

Italian metal band Judas The Dancer have just released the third video in the serious of video singles taken from their upcoming EP “Post Pop Violence” due in September. In an interview for Progarchy, bassist and singer Nicolo Cavallaro and guitarist and singer Marco Paltanin tell us what is it like to be in the band, but also inspiration and more.

What made you go for the name Judas The Dancer?

Nic: We firstly wanted to call ourselves Motaro (the Mortal Kombat character half horse and half man). When Marco heard that he just said “Yeah! Why not Dylan Dog at this point?!” And I said “Dylan not for sure… But Judas Dancer is good!”… We added the “the” just because is so cool…

Marco: I vividly remember we didn’t want to move in circles for days or weeks, awaiting divine inspiration. We solved it briefly in a twenty minutes-chuckle-chuckle-discussion. I guess it could have been something cheesy such as “Baywatch” or fucked-up like “The Bully Bumblebee has a crap, pronto” (Mr.Pickles please, don’t sue me if I steal from you). We were lucky we agreed on Judas The Dancer before anything tragic had happened.

How do you usually describe your music?

Nic: We call it “Post Pop Violence”. And I think there’s no best ways to describe it.

Marco: To me it’s a bastard son of a threesome: metal, funky and a dirty rock. But I wouldn’t trust the way I see things, if I were you. There’s much going on in the songs so yeah, we prefer to describe the mood of our music, instead of its genre. “Post pop violence”, that’s our Klaatu verata Nicto, if you know what I mean.

What is your writing process like?

Nic: For the EP we started from ideas during jams or rehearsal and than we worked on them. The new music is coming out from recorded ideas and than we arrange together. But if some big producer wanna join us to make big money we’re open to proposals…

Marco: Writing together in the rehearsal room was a really convenient approach when we were defining our sound. After all I wouldn’t be honest if I pretended we knew what we wanted to play from the start. We never knew our whole life actually. Now that we work on pre-recorded stuff it’s amazing, because there’s intense agreement and everyone knows exactly how that idea should be evolved. There’s not a song similar to another, of course. But they’re all Post Pop Violence.

Who or what is your inspiration, if you have any?

Nic: All the things happening in this world are potential inspiration. But they have to be very stupid or enjoyable to join Post Pop Violence.

Marco: The Almighty’s Cloak of Invisibility. The guy is so good at hiding under It, He may even convince me He doesn’t exist.

What is your favourite piece on the “Post Pop Violence” EP?

Nic: Every song has its own history, for many reasons… But I would probably say “Maradona Talking Heads!”

Marco: Probably “Along Came Lilì”. I had grown sick and tired of listening to it… but I must confess I enjoy so much playing it live, in all its pimpin’ majesty and length, that’s the best of the lot for me.

What makes “Post Pop Violence” different?

Nic: Post Pop Violence is having interesting arrangements keeping the song listenable and letting ALL the people enjoy it. It’s like playing proggy music into an Irish pub or at least this is what we want to do with JTD.

Marco: The freedom to play whatever you like but never compromising on accessibility on behalf of the listener. When we’ll manage to play before traditional country, pop, chill-out, dubstep, brutal metal audiences without them brow-furrowing, seeing them adapt to your music and enjoy it, the mission of Post Pop Violence will be complete.

What should music lovers expect from “Post Pop Violence”?

Nic: 5 different song (plus 1 cover) but just one single mood.

Marco: Well, I have a bunch of trademarks to sort out to answer this. “We snatch the hidden depravation in listenable music”. “Shape of a puppy. spirit of a murderer”. “The poltergeist of commercial music”. Enough pearls for today, I don’t want to squander it all like a boozer.

What kind of emotions would you like your audience to feel when they listen to your music?

Nic: we just want people to enjoy our music however they see fit. We have heavy parts, we have choruses, we have funky stuff… Wanna mosh? Just mosh! Wanna sing? Just sing! Just enjoy every feeling we share with you!

Marco: It’s in the name. I wanna see them dance with metal like the whole world had become a rubbish tip disco. That’d be something.

Which do you like most, life in the studio or on tour?

Nic: Personally, I like to film videos… Ahah! Tour or studio is both good. I like to play my music and if I can do it it will surely be awesome.

Marco: The studio is the place your ideas take shape. They somehow connect to the flesh and still surprise you, long after you thought you had grasped them for good. I like that part. The stage though is the only place where you can really measure the energy of those ideas. I like that feeling too.

Pick your three favourite albums that you would take on a desert island with you.

Nic: Between The Buried And Me – Colors, Ihshan – Arktis, Huey Lewis and the News – some double CD greatest hits or something like that… Sometimes you just need to smile and relax..